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Chapter Text

I remember everything as if it were just yesterday that I awoke on Reaping Day. One girl and one boy were to be offered up as collateral as punishment for the District 13 uprising 74 years ago. There was only one benefit to reaping day—all the peacekeepers would be too busy patrolling the town square to notice me slip past the fence. I rolled out of bed, slipped on a jacket, and grabbed my satchel before waking my sister, Prim.

My fingers stretched out, searching for Prim’s thin blonde hair, but found only the rough sheets covering the mattress. She must have had a bad dream and climbed in with our mother. Of course, she did. That day would have been her first reaping, which meant her name would be in the drawing.

I propped myself up on one elbow and drew back the thin, stained curtain. Enough light flooded the bedroom to see her curled up on one side, cocooned in Mother's curled thin frame. In sleep, my mother looked younger, still worn, but not so beaten down. Prim's face was as fresh as a rain, as innocent as the primrose for which she was named. It made it all the more painful knowing I had to prepare her for the reaping. Sitting at Prim's knees was the world's ugliest cat, Buttercup. He hissed at me, likely because even though it was years ago, I think he still remembers how I tried to drown him in a bucket when Prim brought him home. The last thing I needed was another mouth to feed. But Prim begged, so I had to let him stay. He earned his keep by getting rid of the vermin that tried to eat through our food stores.

I slid into my hunting boots, the worn leather molding to my feet. On the table, under a wooden bowl to protect it from hungry rats and cats alike, sits the goat cheese Prim made from her goat that she made for me. I put the cheese carefully in my pocket as I slipped outside, leaving behind a note that I was out hunting.

Our part of District 12, nicknamed the Seam, was usually crawling with coal miners heading out to the morning shift at that hour. Men and women with hunched shoulders, swollen knuckles, many who had long since stopped trying to scrub the coal dust out of their broken nails, the lines of their sunken faces. But that day, the streets were empty, even the shutters on the squat gray houses were closed.

Our house was almost at the edge of the Seam. I only had to pass a few gates to reach the field called the Meadow. Separating the Meadow from the woods, in fact enclosing all of District 12, was a high chain-link fence topped with barbed-wire loops. In theory, it was supposed to be electrified twenty-four hours a day as a deterrent to the predators that lived in the woods, packs of wild dogs, lone cougars, and bears that used to threaten our streets. Or in reality, it was designed to keep us in. We were lucky to get two or three hours of electricity in the evenings, so it was usually safe to touch. Even so, I always took a moment to listen carefully for the hum that meant the fence was live. Right then, it was silent. Concealed by a clump of bushes, I flattened out on my belly and slid under a two-foot stretch that had been loose for years. As soon as I was in the trees, I retrieved a bow and a sheath of arrows from a hollow log.

My father had known how to find food there, and he had taught me some before he was blown to bits in a mine explosion. Even though trespassing in the woods was illegal and poaching carried the severest of penalties, more people would have risked it if they had weapons. But most were not bold enough to venture out with just a knife. My bow was a rarity, crafted by my father along with a few others that I kept well hidden in the woods, carefully wrapped in waterproof covers.

"District Twelve. Where you can starve to death in safety," I muttered.

I glanced over my shoulder. Even there, even in the middle of nowhere, you worried someone might overhear you. When I was younger, I had scared my mother to death, the things I would blurt out about District 12, about the people who ruled our country, Panem, from the far-off city called the Capitol. Eventually, I understood this would only lead us to more trouble. So I learned to hold my tongue. I discussed little more than trades in the Hob, which was the black market where I made most of my money. Even at home, where I was less pleasant, I avoided discussing tricky topics. Like the reaping, or food shortages, or the Hunger Games. Prim might have begun to repeat my words, and then where would we have been?

In the woods waited the only person with whom I could truly be myself, aside from Bella. Gale. I could feel the muscles in my face relaxing, my pace quickening as I climbed the hills to our place, a rock ledge overlooking a valley. A thicket of berry bushes protected it from unwanted eyes. The sight of him waiting there brought on a smile. Gale said I never smiled except in the woods.

"Hey, Catnip," said Gale.

My real name was Katniss, but when I first told him, I had barely whispered it. So he thought I'd said Catnip. That was years ago.

"Look what I shot," Gale held up a loaf of bread with an arrow stuck in it, and I laughed. It was real bakery bread, not the flat, dense loaves we made from our grain rations. "Mm, still warm," I said. He must have been at the bakery at the crack of dawn to trade for it. "What did it cost you?".

"Just a squirrel. Think the old man was feeling sentimental that morning," said Gale. "Even wished me luck."

"Well, we all felt a little closer that day, didn't we?" I said, not even bothering to roll my eyes. "Prim left us a cheese." I pulled it out. His expression brightened at the treat. "Thank you, Prim. We'll have a real feast."

Suddenly, he fell into a Capitol accent as he mimicked Effie Trinket, the maniacally upbeat woman who arrived once a year to read out the names at the reaping. "I almost forgot! Happy Hunger Games!"

He tossed a berry in a high arc toward me. I caught it in my mouth and broke the delicate skin with my teeth. The sweet tartness exploded across my tongue.

"—be ever in your favor!" I finished with equal verve. We had to joke about it because the alternative was to be scared out of your wits.

I watched as Gale pulled out his knife and sliced the bread. He could have been my brother. Straight black hair, olive skin, we even had the same gray eyes. But we were not related, at least not closely. There had never been anything romantic between Gale and me. I wasn’t interested in boys anyway. We settled back in a nook in the rocks. The food was wonderful, with the cheese seeping into the warm bread and the berries bursting in our mouths. Everything would have been perfect if it had been a holiday, if all the day off meant was roaming the mountains with Gale, hunting for that night's supper. But instead, we had to be standing in the square at two o'clock waiting for the names to be called out.

"We could do it, you know," Gale said quietly.

"What?" I asked.

"Leave the district. Run off. Live in the woods. You and I, we could make it," said Gale. I didn't know how to respond. The idea was so preposterous. "If we didn't have so many people we cared about," he added quickly.

He was referring to Prim and Bella, who had been my girlfriend for two years. He may as well have thrown in our mothers, too, because how would they live without us? Who would fill those mouths that are always asking for more?

"I could never leave them behind," I said.

"I wouldn’t ask you to," said Gale.

"But you can," I said, irritated. “You could leave now if you wanted.”

"Forget it," he snapped back. The conversation felt all wrong. What good was yelling about the Capitol in the middle of the woods? It didn't change anything.

We finished our hunting, a dozen fish, a bag of greens, and a gallon of strawberries. On the way home, we swung by the Hob, the black market. Jacob was already there, leaning against a stall, talking to a vendor. His smile was easy, a flash of white teeth against his tan skin. He caught my eye and gave a playful wave. Gale gave a little nod in return.

"Did you find anything good?" Gale asked.

Jacob held up a few small, plump rabbits. "Not bad. A few fewer mouths to feed for a couple of days." He winked at Gale. "What about you two?"

"A full bag," Gale replied, and Jacob's gaze softened as he looked at him. He was a friend of Gale’s and was friendly enough toward me, but there was a different kind of intensity in Jacob’s eyes when he looked at him.

We finished our business at the market, selling half the strawberries to the mayor’s daughter, Madge, who opened the door in her expensive white reaping dress. Gale made a cool comment about how she wouldn't be going to the Capitol, and Madge’s face became closed off. She gave us the money for the berries and closed the door.

We walked toward the Seam in silence. I didn't like that Gale had taken a dig at Madge, but he was right, of course. The reaping system was unfair, with the poor getting the worst of it.

"See you in the square," I said to Gale as we parted ways at my house.

"Wear something pretty," he said, a joke that felt flat that day.

I found Bella at the house; her quiet presence was comforting. My mother's face was still blank, lost in her thoughts. She rarely registered anything those days, so she didn't notice Bella eating from our table. She had been absent ever since Dad died in the mines and had never been present enough to acknowledge that her daughter was breaking several laws for being with a girl and hunting, amongst other things. It was better that way. Bella and I helped Prim and my mom get ready with a vacant stare. My mother had laid out a soft blue dress for me to wear. Bella helped me braid my hair. I could hardly recognize myself in the cracked mirror.

"You look beautiful," said Prim in a hushed voice.

"And nothing like myself," I said.

I hugged her because I knew those next few hours would be terrible for her. Her first reaping. She was worried about me because my name was going to be in the reaping several times. I protected Prim in every way I could, even putting my name in the drawing more times in exchange for wheat, but I was powerless against the reaping.

"Tuck your tail in, little duck," I said, smoothing the blouse back in place.

Prim giggled and gave me a small “Quack”.

“Quack yourself,” I said with a light laugh, the kind only Prim could draw out of me.

At one o’clock, we headed for the square, Bella and Prim staying close behind me. Attendance was mandatory. The camera crews perched like buzzards on rooftops. People filed in silently and signed in. Twelve through eighteen-year-olds were herded into roped areas marked off by ages, the oldest in the front, the young ones, like Prim, toward the back. Family members lined up around the perimeter, holding tightly to one another’s hands. The space got tighter, more claustrophobic.

I found myself standing in a clump of sixteens from the Seam along with Bella. Bella nudged me with a worried look on her face. He hand grazed mine.

“We can't,” I whisper.

She looked me in the eyes, her eyebrows furrowed. “They won’t see, please.”

We looked straight ahead, holding each other’s hands in the crowd as we focused our attention on the temporary stage that was set up before the Justice Building. It held three chairs, a podium, but no tables or bowls. They were missing, or perhaps they hadn’t brought them out yet?

Two of the three chairs were filled with Mayor Undersee and Effie Trinket, District 12’s escort, fresh from the Capitol with her scary white grin, pinkish hair, and spring green suit. They murmured to each other and then looked with concern at the empty seat.

Just as the town clock struck two, the mayor stepped up to the podium and began to read. It was the same story every year. He told of the history of Panem, the country that rose out of the ashes of a place that was once called North America. He listed the disasters, the droughts, the storms, the fires, the encroaching seas that swallowed up so much of the land, the brutal war for what little sustenance remained. The result was Panem, a shining Capitol ringed by thirteen districts, which brought peace and prosperity to its citizens. Then came the Dark Days, the uprising of the districts against the Capitol. Twelve were defeated, the thirteenth obliterated. The Treaty of Treason gave us the new laws to guarantee peace.

“And as our yearly reminder that the Dark Days must never be repeated,” the Mayor intoned, his voice gaining a manufactured gravity, “President Snow has decided this year’s games will be different.”

The crowd stirred.

“On this 74th annual reaping, two boys and two girls will be reaped to cleanse our society of all unnatural inclinations. These individuals, already identified through rigorous societal monitoring as holding affections outside the natural order, would be imprisoned in a vast outdoor arena. Over several weeks, the competitors must fight to the death. The last tribute standing, if indeed any remained, will be announced as the winners of the games. Their district, if they survived, would be showered with prizes and a public re-education campaign on the virtues of the traditions upheld by the capital.”

He continued, his voice unwavering, "This is the Capitol's way of reminding us how we are at their mercy. How little chance we would stand of surviving another rebellion. And a powerful lesson: that bonds born of selfish, deviant desires will always turn to dust under pressure. Thus, this year will mark the first annual Purification Games."

Whatever words they used, the real message was clear: Look how we take your children, your beloved, and sacrifice them, and there’s nothing you can do. If you lift a finger, we will destroy every last one of you. Just as we did in District Thirteen. And we will use your sin against you, until it breaks you.

To make it humiliating as well as torturous, the Capitol required us to treat the Hunger Games as a festivity, a sporting event pitting every district against the others. "It is both a time for repentance and a time for thanks," intoned the mayor.

Then he read the list of past District 12 victors. In seventy-four years, we had had exactly two. Only one was still alive. Haymitch Abernathy, a paunchy, middle-aged man, who at that moment appeared hollering something unintelligible, staggered onto the stage and fell into the third chair. He was drunk. The mayor looked distressed. He quickly tried to pull the attention back to the reaping by introducing Effie Trinket.

Bright and bubbly as ever, Effie Trinket trotted to the podium and gave her signature, “Happy Purification Games!”

Bella squeezed my hand tight. I dared not look at her now that it was clear the capital may very well have known about us. Her hand shook in mine as I breathed. At least I knew Prim was safe from the games. There would be no drawing that year after all.

Through the crowd, I spotted Gale looking back at me with a ghost of a smile. It was time for the calling of names. Effie Trinket said as she always did, “Ladies first!” and crossed to the podium, smoothed the slip of paper, and read out the name in a clear voice.

"Bella Swan!"

My blood froze. My breath caught. It was exactly as I had feared. The entire square seemed to hold its breath. Bella let go of my hand and could barely move before the peacekeepers ripped her away from me. She looked back at me, tears flowing down her cheeks.

Bella? Wait, no… Not her.

“Bella!” I called out to her, shoving past the crowd to reach her. “Bella!” I yelled again.

A gasp ripped through the crowd. My eyes found Bella's, wide with terror, then resolute. The unspoken vow: I'm not going anywhere.

Peacekeepers divided the crowd and grabbed me harshly by the shoulders. This isn’t how this is supposed to go. What about the drawing? What about Prim? I can’t leave her behind. I tried to fight against them to find some way to stop this bad dream.

Before the murmurs could truly break out, Effie spoke into the microphone once more.

"Katniss Everdeen!"

A gasp ripped through the crowd. My eyes found Bella's, wide with terror, then resolute. The unspoken vow: I'm not going anywhere.

Effie Trinket, with sickening glee, then announced, "Now for the boys!" She smiled as she spoke. "Peeta Mellark!"

Peeta, a strong blonde boy, I recognized as the son of the baker’s slowly made his way to the stage. He was shorter in height than most boys his age.

Another name was called almost immediately. "Edward Cullen!"

I looked to the crowd before me to see a tall, bronze-haired boy of tall stature being yanked away by two peacekeepers as he tried to fight them off, screaming that he’d kill them all. The Capitol had selected its couples. It was a baseless threat, but it never stopped people from trying to get away.

Bella and I looked at each other with a horrible understanding passing between us. We were being paraded around as a public display of the Capitol's power. Two peacekeepers, their faces hard, moved to escort us to the stage.

I looked out over the crowd, past my mother's blank stare, past Prim's trembling face, and I found Gale and Jacob.

"Don't let Prim starve!" I yelled out.

I saw their eyes, my face contorted in grief and anger. Bella, next to me, just shook her head. She panicked, her face pale, and her hands trembling. The peacekeepers took hold of our arms and dragged us through the heavy metal doors, away from everything we knew.

Chapter Text

One time, when I was in a blind in a tree, waiting motionless for game to wander by, I dozed off and fell ten feet to the ground, landing on my back. It was as if the impact had knocked every wisp of air from my lungs, and I lay there struggling to inhale, to exhale, to do anything. That was how I felt now, trying to remember how to breathe, unable to speak, totally stunned as the name bounced around the inside of my skull.

Someone was gripping my arm, a Peacekeeper, and I thought maybe I had started to fall and he had dragged me away. There must have been some mistake. This couldn’t be happening. There had always been a drawing of names, slips of paper in thousands! Bella’s chances of being chosen were so remote that I had not even bothered to worry about her. Hadn’t I done everything? One slip. One slip in thousands. The odds had been entirely in her favor. But it hadn’t mattered. The odds were never in our favor this year. It was all rigged from the start.

Somewhere far away, I could hear the crowd murmuring unhappily behind the heavy metal doors as they always did when the capital changed rules because no one thought this was fair. And then I saw her, the blood drained from her face, hands clenched in fists at her sides, walking with stiff, small steps up with the Peacekeepers holding her shoulders tight. I saw that the back of her dress had wrinkled, and one sleeve had fallen off her shoulder. It was this detail, the sleeve falling off of her thin frame, that brought me back to myself.

“Bella!” The strangled cry came out of my throat, and my muscles began to move again. “Bella!”

I didn’t need to shove the Peacekeepers away. With the doors to District 12 closed and metal-guarded walls of the Justice Building all around us, they let us go. I reached her just as she was about to fall. With one sweep of my arm, I caught her.

“I’m here,” I gasped. “I’m not going to let you die.”

There was some confusion on the stage outside. I could hear their uproarious cries. The districts had never been reaped of specific individuals. There were no protocols in place for four hand-picked tributes to be reaped. The rule was that tributes were to be pulled from thousands of other names. That was how it had occurred for the last 74 years. In some districts, where winning the reaping was such a great honor, people were eager to risk their lives, and volunteering was commonplace. But this year, there would be no volunteers, no names randomly picked, and no chance of escape.
“Lovely!” said Effie Trinket.

“But I believe there’s a small matter of introducing the reaping winner and then asking for volunteers, and if one does come forth, then we, um...” she trailed off, unsure herself.

“What does it matter?” said the mayor.

He was looking at me with a pained expression on his face. He didn’t know me really, but there was a faint recognition there. I was the girl who brought the strawberries. The girl, his daughter, might have spoken of on occasion. The girl who, five years ago, had stood huddled with her mother and sister, as he presented her, the oldest child, with a medal of valor. A medal for her father, vaporized in the mines. Did he remember that?

“What does it matter?” he repeated gruffly. “There is no need for volunteers this year.”

I could hear Prim’s hysterical screaming.

“No, Katniss! No! You can’t go!”

“I’m so sorry, Prim,” I whispered, but I knew my voice wouldn’t reach her from in here.

When they televised the replay of the reapings tonight, everyone would make note of my tears, and I would be marked as an easy target. A weakling. I would give no one that satisfaction.

All of this was wrong.

I let go of Bella, but her hand shot out and caught mine, her grip surprisingly strong. She didn't crumble; she stood her ground beside me, her jaw set as she followed my gaze to the window. Together, we stepped forward.

“What does it matter?” Bella whispered, her voice cracking. “There is only ever one victor, and we both know I’m not the type to take a life.”

If she wouldn't fight for her life, then I would have to fight for both of us. The Capitol had reaped us as a lesson in deviancy. Anyone who refused to reproduce and create workers to feed the capital committed treason. But I had no desire for children or to feed the bellies of anyone but those I held close. For causing Bella such pain, I would make them regret it.

I turned my gaze back to the window. My eyes scanned the crowd of family members, past my mother's blank stare, past Prim's trembling face, and landed on Charlie Swan. His face, usually so stoic and reserved, was ashen, his hands clenched into white-knuckled fists at his sides. He looked like a man watching his entire world be dismantled before his eyes.

At first one, then another, then almost every member of the crowd touched the three middle fingers of their left hand to their lips and held them out to me. It was an old and rarely used gesture of our district, occasionally seen at funerals. It meant thanks, it meant admiration, it meant good-bye to someone you love. Now I was truly in danger of crying, but fortunately Haymitch chose this time to come staggering into the room.

“Look at her. Look at this one!” he hollered, throwing an arm around my shoulders. He was surprisingly strong for such a wreck. “I like her!” His breath reeked of liquor, and it had been a long time since he’d bathed. “Lots of . . . “ He couldn’t think of the word for a while. “Spunk!” he said triumphantly. “More than you!” He released me and started for Bella. “More than you!” he shouted, pointing directly towards her.

Was he trying to taunt her, or was he so drunk he’d forgotten why we were reaped? I would never know because just as he was opening his mouth to continue, Haymitch stumbled towards one of the Peacekeepers keeping guard and knocked himself unconscious. For a moment, I yearned for something . . . the idea of all of us leaving the district . . . making our way in the woods . . . but I knew I had been right about not running off. With the way things were going, they would have hunted us down or taken it out on District 12 as they had with District 13. Haymitch was whisked away on a stretcher. I was at the window as Effie Trinket tried to get the ball rolling again.

“What an exciting day!” she warbled as she attempted to straighten her wig, which had slipped severely to the right. Clearly hoping to contain her tenuous hair situation, she planted one hand on her head as she closed up the ceremony.

I saw them both, the boys. First, Peeta Mellark, medium height, stocky build, ashy blond hair that fell in waves over his forehead, was dragged through the large metal doors as they screeched open and then slammed shut again. The shock of the moment was registering on his face; you could see his struggle to remain emotionless, but his blue eyes showed the alarm I had seen so often in prey. He stared at the floor in front of him and at nothing else. He had two older brothers, I knew; I had seen them in the bakery, but one was probably too old now to volunteer, and the other wouldn’t. Not that it would have mattered in this situation. The mayor began to read the long, dull Treaty of Treason as he did every year at this point—it was required—but I wasn’t listening to a word. Why him? I thought. What undesirable thing had he done? Then I tried to convince myself it didn’t matter. Peeta Mellark and I were not friends. Not even neighbors. We didn’t speak. Our only real interaction had happened years ago. He had probably forgotten it. But I hadn’t and I knew I never would. . . .

It was during the worst time. My father had been killed in a mine accident three months earlier in the bitterest January anyone could remember. The numbness of his loss had passed, and the pain would hit me out of nowhere, doubling me over, racking my body with sobs. I had given every bit of food I had to Prim and Bella. Their survival was always more important than mine.

Where are you? I would cry out in my mind. Where have you gone? Of course, there was never any answer. The district had given us a small amount of money as compensation for his death, enough to cover one month of grieving, at which time my mother would be expected to get a job. Only she didn’t. She didn’t do anything but sit propped up in a chair or, more often, huddle under the blankets on her bed, eyes fixed on some point in the distance. Once in a while, she would stir, get up as if moved by some urgent purpose, only to then collapse back into stillness. No amount of pleading from Prim seemed to affect her. I was terrified. I suppose now that my mother was locked in some dark world of sadness, but at the time, all I knew was that I had lost not only a father, but a mother as well. At eleven years old, with Prim just seven, I had taken over as head of the family. There had been no choice. I bought our food at the market and cooked it as best I could, and tried to keep Prim and myself looking presentable. Because if it had become known that my mother could no longer care for us, the district would have taken us away from her and placed us in the community home. Bella and I did whatever we could to take care of each other and Prim, acting more as her parents than a sister and friend. We had been schoolmates and childhood friends. I never intended to fall in love with her. It happened slowly until I realized one day that I couldn’t live without her.

I had grown up seeing those home kids at school. The sadness, the marks of angry hands on their faces, the hopelessness that curled their shoulders forward. I could never let that happen to Prim. Sweet, tiny Prim who cried when I cried before she even knew the reason, who brushed and plaited my mother’s hair before we left for school, who still polished my father’s shaving mirror each night because he had hated the layer of coal dust that settled on everything in the Seam. The community home would have crushed her like a bug.

So I kept our predicament a secret, as well as my relationship with Bella. But the money ran out, and we were slowly starving to death. There was no other way to put it. I kept telling myself if I could only hold out until May, just May 8th, I would turn twelve and be able to sign up for the tesserae and get that precious grain and oil to feed us. Only there were still several weeks to go. We could well be dead by then. Starvation was not an uncommon fate in District 12. Who hadn’t seen the victims? Older people who couldn’t work. Children from a family with too many to feed. Those injured in the mines. Straggling through the streets. And one day, you came upon them sitting motionless against a wall or lying in the Meadow, you heard the wails from a house, and the Peacekeepers were called in to retrieve the body. Starvation was never the cause of death officially. It was always that they had dissented and chosen to starve in an act of defiance. But that fooled no one.

On the afternoon of my encounter with Peeta Mellark, the rain was falling in relentless icy sheets. I had been in town, trying to trade some threadbare old baby clothes of Prim’s in the public market while Bella watched her at home, but there had been no takers. Although I had been to the Hob on several occasions with my father, I was too frightened to venture into that rough, gritty place alone. The rain had soaked through my father’s hunting jacket, leaving me chilled to the bone. For three days, we’d had nothing but crumbs and boiled water with some old dried mint leaves I had found in the back of a cupboard. All of it I had given to Bella and Prim. By the time the market closed, I was shaking so hard I dropped my bundle of baby clothes in a mud puddle. I didn’t pick it up for fear I would keel over and be unable to regain my feet. Besides, no one wanted those clothes.

I found myself stumbling along a muddy lane behind the shops that served the wealthiest townspeople. I held my tongue out to the rain to catch the rainfall to quell my dry throat. The merchants lived above their businesses, so I was essentially in their backyards. I remembered the outlines of garden beds not yet planted for the spring, a goat or two in a pen, one sodden dog tied to a post, hunched defeated in the muck. All forms of stealing were forbidden in District 12. Punishable by death. But it crossed my mind that there might be something in the trash bins, and those were fair game. Perhaps a bone at the butcher’s or rotted vegetables at the grocer’s, something no one but my family was desperate enough to eat. Unfortunately, the bins had just been emptied. When I passed the baker’s, the smell of fresh bread was so overwhelming I felt dizzy. The ovens were in the back, and a golden glow spilled out of the open kitchen door. I stood mesmerized by the heat and the luscious scent until the rain interfered, running its icy fingers down my back, forcing me back to life. I lifted the lid to the baker’s trash bin and found it spotlessly, heartlessly bare.

Suddenly, a voice was screaming at me, and I looked up to see the baker’s wife, telling me to move on and asking if I wanted her to call the Peacekeepers, and how sick she was of having those brats from the Seam pawing through her trash. The words were ugly, and I had no defense. As I carefully replaced the lid and backed away, I noticed him, a boy with blond hair peering out from behind his mother’s back. I’d seen him at school. He was in my year, but I didn’t know his name. He stuck with the town kids, so how would I?

But he wasn't alone. Leaning against the pigpen fence was another boy, taller, with bronze hair. I had barely remembered him as Edward Cullen until today, when his name was called. He was holding a bucket of slops, but he was frozen, watching the scene unfold with an intense, unreadable expression. I knew of the Cullens, the doctors' family who kept to themselves. They were townspeople, but different. They didn't quite fit in, either. All I knew of them was that their father, Carlisle Cullen, sometimes sent his overflow patients to my mother, who was somewhat of a medicine woman, but she had taken barely any patients since Dad died.

His mother went back into the bakery, grumbling, but the two boys must have been watching me as I made my way behind the pen that held their pig and leaned against the far side of an old apple tree. The realization that I would have nothing to take home had finally sunk in. My knees buckled, and I slid down the tree trunk to its roots. It was too much. I was too sick and weak, and tired. Let them call the Peacekeepers and take us to the community home, I thought. Or better yet, let me die right here in the rain.

There was a clatter in the bakery, and I heard the woman screaming again and the sound of a blow, and I vaguely wondered what was going on. Feet sloshed toward me through the mud, and I thought, It’s her. She’s coming to drive me away with a stick. But it wasn’t her. It was the boys.

Peeta emerged first. In his arms, he carried two large loaves of bread that must have fallen into the fire because the crusts were scorched black. Edward was right behind him, his usual aloofness replaced by a look of sharp concern, his eyes flicking from Peeta to my huddled form under the tree.

From inside, his mother was yelling, “Feed it to the pig, you stupid creature! Why not? No one decent will buy burned bread!”

Peeta began to tear off chunks from the burned parts and toss them into the trough, his movements stiff. Edward stood beside him, not helping, just watching—watching me. He often worked as a stable boy, as he was averse to the blood of the doctor’s office. That much I knew from seeing him keel over at the sight of a papercut at school one day. The front bakery bell rang, and the mother disappeared to help a customer.

That was when it happened. Edward, who had been silent the whole time, suddenly spoke, his voice low but clear.

'Now, Peeta.'

He didn't even glance my way, but he moved to block the kitchen window with his body, shielding us from view. Peeta, understanding instantly, thrust the two perfect loaves into Edward's hands. In one fluid motion, Edward Cullen drew his arm back and threw the first loaf of bread straight at me.

It landed in the mud a foot away. The second loaf quickly followed, tossed more gently by Peeta to land beside the first. Then they both turned and sloshed back to the bakery, Edward closing the kitchen door tightly behind them. I stared at the loaves in disbelief. They were fine, perfect really, except for the burned areas. Did they mean for me to have them? They must have. Because there they were. Before anyone could return, I shoved the loaves up under my shirt, wrapped the hunting jacket tightly about me, and walked swiftly away.

The heat of the bread burned into my skin, but I clutched it tighter, clinging to life. By the time I reached home, the loaves had cooled somewhat, but the insides were still warm. When I dropped them on the table, Prim’s hands reached to tear off a chunk, but I made her sit, forced my mother to join us at the table, and poured warm tea. I tore off a piece and handed it to Bella.

“Here, you eat first,” I insisted.

She pushed it back to me. “You’ve had nothing for days. You eat first.”

Prim tore off another piece and handed it to Bella. “Here, now both of you can stop bickering.”

We ate an entire loaf, slice by slice. It was good, hearty bread, filled with raisins and nuts. I sent Bella back home with her father, with a small bit of bread for him, who had returned from his shift in the mines. I put my clothes to dry by the fire, crawled into bed, and fell into a dreamless sleep. It didn’t occur to me until the next morning that the boy might have burned the bread on purpose. Might have dropped the loaves into the flames, knowing it meant being punished, and then delivered them to me. But I dismissed this. It must have been an accident. Why would he have done it? He didn’t even know me. Still, just throwing me the bread was an enormous kindness that would have surely resulted in a beating if discovered. I couldn’t explain his actions. We ate slices of bread for breakfast and headed to school. It was as if spring had come overnight. Warm sweet air. Fluffy clouds.

At school, I passed the boy in the hall. His cheek had swelled up, and his eye had blackened. He was with his friends and didn’t acknowledge me in any way. But as I collected Prim and started for home that afternoon, I found him staring at me from across the school yard. Our eyes met for only a second, then he turned his head away. I dropped my gaze, embarrassed, and that was when I saw it. The first dandelion of the year.

A bell went off in my head.

But why Peeta? And why Edward Cullen? My mind raced. Was it because his father sometimes gave extra bread to the sick in the Seam? No, that was too trivial. Then it hit me. The way he and Edward Cullen had been in the backyard that day. The silent understanding that had passed between them as they threw me the bread. Had someone seen them together since? Had they been careless? The Capitol must be framing them as a pair, just like they had paired me with Bella. The thought was so absurd I almost laughed. Peeta Mellark and Edward Cullen? But then I remembered the intensity in Edward's gaze, the way Peeta had handed him the loaf—a gesture of trust. Was there something more there? Or did the Capitol simply need a boy from a merchant family to make their point?

I thought of the hours spent in the woods with my father, and I knew how we were going to survive. To this day, I could never shake the connection between these two boys, Peeta Mellark and Edward Cullen, and the bread that gave me hope, and the dandelion that reminded me that I was not doomed. And more than once, I had turned in the school hallway and caught his eyes trained on me, only to quickly flit away. I felt like I owed him something, and I hated owing people. Maybe if I had thanked him at some point, I would be feeling less conflicted now. I had thought about it a couple of times, but the opportunity never seemed to present itself. And now it never would. Because we were going to be thrown into an arena to fight to the death.

Exactly how was I supposed to work in a thank-you in there? Somehow, it just wouldn’t seem sincere if I were trying to slit his throat.

The mayor finished the dreary Treaty of Treason. Peeta finally looked up from the hardwood floor and looked me right in the eye and gave my hand what I thought was meant to be a reassuring squeeze. Maybe it was just a nervous spasm. I pulled my hand away.

Then the taller boy, Edward Cullen, was shoved into the metal-walled room with us. The door clanged shut, sealing our fate. For a long moment, no one spoke. Bella was trembling beside me, and Peeta stared at the wall.

I turned, pulling Bella slightly behind me. Edward Cullen was not resigned. His eyes, full of a fire I remembered from the bakery, were fixed on Peeta with a fierce, desperate intensity. He took a single, deliberate step towards him, his hands flexing at his sides as if he wanted to reach out but was trapped in an invisible cage.

"Peeta," Edward said, his voice low and urgent, cutting through the thick silence.

Peeta flinched but didn't look up. "Don't."

"This is my fault," Edward hissed, his composure cracking. "If I had been more careful—"

"Stop it," Peeta interrupted, finally meeting his gaze. His blue eyes were full of pain. "It doesn't matter whose fault it is. We're here."

The Capitol's fiction of their "unnatural affections" suddenly felt terrifyingly real. There was a bond here, one I hadn't seen, or even known about, and it had made them a target.

Oh, well, I thought. There would be forty-eight of us. Odds were someone else would kill them before I did.

Of course, the odds had not been very dependable of late.